One Stop Poetry

I've just joined a new writing group, One Stop Poetry, and today is One Shot Wednesday! So, I'm posting one poem for Wednesday to share with everyone who visits my blog. This is a poem about awakening, growing, and recognizing one's position and orientation in the universe.

On Becoming One With Earth

My feet are planted in this lusty soil called life,
this pungent dirt which covered, nourished, then released me,
still forming, still growing, still becoming,
new and bitter and sweet.

Secrets have revealed themselves to me,
bit by bit, piece by piece, season by season,
as truth reveals itself in dreams and scattered visions.
Thus I am a knower of secrets, a product of dreams.

Eternity has made me.
I am a design wrought by intricacies of time.
I go from unknown to unknown
in a ceaseless gathering of knowledge.

Wisdom learns of me, finds me, leads me, ordains me, loves me.
My heart opens like a ripe seed,
splitting deep and red and wet,
spilling forth torrents of glistening fruit.

Returning again and again
to the rich and fertile ground,
I give, I bend, I grow.
Branches bend from me; forests grow from me.

My arms thrust upward from this luscious earth,
open handed, glad with life,
and my fingers touch God's gentle breath
upon the ancient ageless winds of dawn.

copyright Ramey Channell 2010

What Do Poetry, Coffee, and Dan Fogelberg Have In Common?

"There's a heaven on earth that so few ever find.

But the map's in your soul and the road's in your mind."

Dan Fogelberg

Today we continued to celebrate poetry at our public library. I read selections from my poetry chapbook, TOKENS, with a few extras thrown in, to a packed house! The house was packed with Ms. Boone's senior English class, and a few adult poetry enthusiasts. The poem that seemed to be the hit of the day was my Love, Alabama Style, a rather lengthy poem about an ill-tempered, jealous cat.

While the teen audience, as well as the adults, were attentive and adroit during the reading, an abundance of coffee was consumed after the program, and a festive rip ensued. Robert Frost would have been proud of us!

The teens returned again and again, until the coffee pot was empty, asking pertinent questions about poetry writing, and expressing their own individual creativity in exuberant fashion.

After the students left the building and relative calm descended, I listened to a few Dan Fogelberg songs, and remembered what a great song writer he was. Many of his songs dealt with his hopes that we would all find a way to rescue and preserve the beauty of our environment. He sang about the beauty and magic in natural surroundings and what we all have at our fingertips, and could easily lose if we aren't attentive.

And here's Dan, drinking coffee, and getting kissed by a black kitty. Or, is the cat trying to get the coffee?

Cats, coffee, poetry and beautiful music ... these are a few of my favorite things.